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Solid Efforts At Frogtown For Cross Country Team
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Earlier this month the Cougar cross country runners traveled to San Francisco and competed in a Division 1 meet. This past week they ran in a Division 4 invitational at Frogtown, running in their own division.

“Running with the higher divisions really pushes us to get better. We had a hard week of training this week so Saturday was tough mentally and physically for our runners,” explained head coach Rick Heflin. “It was a good test of our fitness levels. Several athletes were still able to pull of personal records even at the end of the week.”

Escalon’s frosh/soph girls won the meet. Leading the group in seventh place was Chloe Hernandez in 16:34. The top seven of the team that all got medals were Samantha Torres 16:41, Jill Junqueiro 18:12, Carla Cordova 18:18, Julia Avila 18:20, Belen Lechuga-Soto 18:42, and Rachel Lau 19:12.

Sophomore boys took third place paced by CJ Borrego in fifth place in 13:02. Also competing were Josh Corrales 13:15, Ryan Belleto 13:49, Connor Lambeth 14:03, Logan Mendes 14:39, Kenny Rowanski 14:48, and Alex Velazquez 15:30.

In the varsity girls race Briana Briones took third in the race in 21:00, after she and another girl went the wrong way and had to turn around and run through the pack to get back to the front.

“This week we get another look at the course when we travel to the Mother Lode League meet. Briana will get a chance to see how well she does when she runs just the course and not extra,” said Heflin.

The JV boys placed third in the race and taking home individual medals were Alex Calderon, fourth in 20:11, Daniel Luis, Manny Diaz, Miguel Marmol and Clayton Ferreira. Varsity boys placed fifth with Braiden Vega their top placer, finishing 12th. Gabe Romero, Emiliano Ramirez and Juan Lopez placed in the top 25 and all four boys medaled.

The cross country team is still collecting pledges for the jog-a-thon that happens on Thursday, Sept. 20. If you would like to support the cross country team but have not run into a cross country athlete, contact Coach Heflin at the high school 209-606-3871 ext. 7025 or coachheff23@yahoo.com. Money raised by this event and the cross country invite is used for uniforms, lodging, training weekend, equipment, team gear, and team support.